Trump meets with Macron in first international trip since reelection: ‘World is going a little crazy right now’
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(PARIS) — President-elect Donald Trump kicked off his first foreign trip since his reelection with a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysee Palace.
Ahead of the meeting, Macron welcomed Trump, saying, “It’s a great honor for the French people to welcome you five years later.”
Macron thanked Trump for his “solidarity” and “immediate action” during his first presidency: “You were at the time the president, the first time, and I remember the solidarity and your immediate action. Welcome back again. Thank you. We are very happy to have you here.”
Trump in return celebrated the “great success” the United States and France had together on “defense and offense” during his first term and said they will talk about how the world is “going a little crazy right now.”
“Thank you very much. Very great honor. And we had a great relationship. As everyone knows, we accomplished a lot together,” he said. “And the people of France are spectacular. I guess it’s one of our largest groups in the United States, French people, and we respect them and we love them. Very talented people, extremely energetic people, as you know very well, yeah, and it’s an honor to be here.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy joined Macron and Trump at about 11:34 a.m. Eastern time. However, he did not offer remarks ahead of the meeting.
Trump is in France to partake in the reopening ceremonies for Notre Dame more than five years after a fire severely damaged the cathedral. First lady Jill Biden is also among the representatives from around the world attending the ceremonies.
The meeting comes at a time when Macron’s government is undergoing a political crisis after his prime minister, Michel Barnier, resigned after facing a no-confidence vote. Macron, who became president in 2017, has vowed he will serve until the end of his term in 2027 despite facing calls from some to resign.
“We had a good time together, and we had a lot of lot of success, really great success, working together on defense and offense too,” Trump said of the U.S.-French relationship in his first administration. “And it certainly seems like the world is going a little crazy right now, and we’ll be talking about that.”
Trump arrived at the Elysee Palace around 10:41 a.m. and met with Macron outside before walking into the building around 10:43 a.m. Eastern time. He was also set to meet with Prince William, the Prince of Wales, for the first time since 2019, but their meeting before the Notre Dame ceremony was canceled.
(WASHINGTON) — Following Vice President JD Vance’s comments Sunday arguing that “judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power,” some Republican lawmakers have pushed back and reiterated the power of the courts.
As President Donald Trump continues to try to remake the federal government through a flood of executive orders, the number of legal challenges to his efforts have piled up, with federal courts across the country siding with plaintiffs to pause his plans as judges sort out the legality of his actions.
On Tuesday, Trump lashed out on his Truth Social platform against “certain activists and highly political judges” who he says want to “slow down” or stop his administration’s efforts to investigate “FRAUD, WASTE, AND ABUSE.”
However, some Republican lawmakers are not completely on board with the administration’s strong stance criticizing the courts.
“We’ve got a system of checks and balances, and that’s what I see working,” Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley said Monday night. “I learned in eighth grade civics about checks and balances, and I just expect the process to work its way out.”
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said he believes the courts have an “important role to play” in moderating power.
“The courts obviously are the sort of the branch of our government that calls balls and strikes and referees and I think that they’ve got an important role to play,” Thune said. “I mean we have three branches of our government in this country, coequal and independent branches, and the judiciary is the one that resolves some of the differences that often occur between executive and legislative branches.”
Thune said the judiciary has moderated a number executive and congressional decisions in recent years.
“I expect that to continue, and I expect the court to play the important role of ensuring that you know the laws of the country are followed,” he added.
Sen. Josh Hawley, who serves on the Judiciary Committee and is a former state attorney general and Supreme Court clerk, called Vance’s comments an “understandable reaction” to frustration about the court’s rulings. But, he said, the courts are independent, and their rulings need to be followed.
“You may think that’s not the right ruling, but you know, they’re still the law,” Hawley said, adding that he believes the administration should abide by court rulings.
Hawley said executives have a right to challenge and appeal and to follow orders but not apply them broadly.
During an interview on “The Mark Levin Show” Monday evening, Trump said the blocking of some of his executive actions by court order are “bad rulings.”
“Frankly, they want to sort of tell everybody how to run the country,” the president added during the interview, arguing that there are “very important people, smart people doing investigations of fraud,” and criticizing the courts for calling this “unconstitutional.”
“But judges should be ruling. They shouldn’t be dictating what you’re supposed to be doing,” Trump said.
However, some Republican leaders continue to back the administration.
During a press conference Tuesday morning, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson endorsed the vice president’s assertion by saying, “I agree wholeheartedly with Vice President JD Vance because he’s right.”
Though Johnson acknowledged “of course the branches have to respect our constitutional order,” he also said, “I think the courts should take a step back and allow these processes to play out.”
The speaker added that he does not feel uncomfortable with the president’s power and that the administration is doing “what’s right by the American people.”
(WASHINGTON) — A group of 191 House and Senate Democrats sent a letter to Russell Vought, the newly installed director of the Office of Management and Budget, and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, calling on them to reverse course on actions targeting the nation’s consumer financial watchdog agency.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) was created by Congress in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis to safeguard Americans against unfair business practices. It has been brought to a virtual standstill after Vought, who last week was named the agency’s acting director, and Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency took control of the agency. Vought has since issued a stop-work order to nearly all CFPB staff.
Democrats, in their letter, are calling for Musk’s DOGE employees, some of whom physically accessed the agency’s federal office and requested access to its industry and consumer data, to be pulled out of the CFPB.
“Your efforts to dismantle the CFPB are dangerous, and we will fight them at every turn. We ask that you remove Mr. Musk’s operatives from the CFPB, restore all internal and external systems and operations, and allow the CFPB to continue to do its job of protecting American consumers,” the Democrats wrote in their letter.
The letter is signed by all Senate Democrats and the two independents — Sen. Angus King, of Maine, and Sen. Bernie Sanders, of Vermont — who caucus with them.
During remarks on Monday from the Oval Office, President Donald Trump said the CFPB was “very important to get rid of” and that the organization was “set up to destroy some very good people.”
When asked if his goal was to completely get rid of the agency, Trump answered in the affirmative.
“I would say yeah, because we’re trying to get rid of waste, fraud and abuse,” Trump said.
Democrats in their letter allege that efforts to sideline the financial watchdog will harm consumers and are potentially illegal.
“The Trump Administration has effectively fired the financial cop on the beat and declared open season for predatory lenders and scam artists working to steal Americans’ money and threaten their financial security,” Democrats said in the letter.
“No matter how badly someone has been cheated and no matter how extensive the scam, the Administration has declared that the financial cops should simply stand by and watch while giant networks of lenders cheat American consumers,” the letter continued. “This is particularly costly for people whose claims of illegal foreclosures, car repossessions, or debanking are currently under investigation by the agency.”
The letter comes as congressional Democrats, who are in the minority in both the House and the Senate, have vowed to use their limited tools to challenge what they say is illegal overreach by the Trump administration and Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency across a number of agencies, including USAID, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the National Institutes of Health and the CFPB.
The National Treasury Employees Union filed two lawsuits this week against Vought, challenging both the takeover of the CFPB and DOGE’s access to its records.
The letter is led by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, of Massachusetts, who is the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee and helped create the CFPB after the 2008 financial crash. In the days since Elon Musk posted “RIP CFPB” on X, Warren has been a vocal defender of the agency.
Since it was established in 2011, the CFPB says it has clawed back nearly $21 billion for American consumers, addressing complaints over everything from bank fees to credit cards to student loans.
On Tuesday, Warren implored Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, who was appearing before the Senate Banking Committee, to work with Congress to keep Musk’s team out of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
“If the CFPB is not there examining these giant banks to make sure they are following the laws, are not cheating consumers, who is doing that job?” Warren asked Powell during the hearing.
“I can say no other federal regulators,” Powell replied.
“No one. In other words thanks to ‘co-president’ Musk and the CFPB Acting Director Vought, Wall Street banks no longer have to show the bank examiners that they’re not illegally opening accounts people didn’t ask for, like what happened with Wells Fargo, or charging illegal junk fees like Bank of America did,” Warren said.
But some Republicans on the panel pushed back on this line of questioning, saying laws that regulate banks haven’t changed and Elon Musk is simply carrying out the work Trump promised on the campaign.
“There’s been a lot of conversation, both in and out of this hearing room today, conversations about a co-president, referencing Elon Musk, referencing the work that DOGE is doing,” said Alabama Republican Sen. Katie Britt. “I think it’s important to remember that President Trump ran on this. I mean, he said we’re going to look for wasteful spending across our government.”
Democrats, in their letter, say they’ll fight to defend the agency.
“We beat back all prior efforts to gut this agency, and we will fight this latest attack in Congress, the courts, and the public,” the lawmakers wrote. “It will fail.”
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump on Wednesday sent a message to Russian President Vladimir Putin telling him to make a deal now to end the war in Ukraine, threatening economic consequences if he doesn’t.
“It’s time to ‘MAKE A DEAL.’ NO MORE LIVES SHOULD BE LOST!!!” Trump wrote in a new social media post.
Trump indicated that if a deal isn’t made quickly, he would place high levels of taxes, tariffs and sanctions on Russia.
“Settle now, and STOP this ridiculous War! IT’S ONLY GOING TO GET WORSE. If we don’t make a “deal,” and soon, I have no other choice but to put high levels of Taxes, Tariffs, and Sanctions on anything being sold by Russia to the United States, and various other participating countries,” Trump said.
Trump then threatened that it can be done “the easy way, or the hard way.”
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office on Monday night, Trump indicated he’d be speaking with Russian President Vladimir Putin in person.
“I’ll be meeting with President Putin,” Trump said, but didn’t say when that might happen.
Trump also indicated that Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelenskyy was willing to come to the negotiating table, but is unsure if Putin would, too.
“He told me he wants to make a deal. He wants to make — Zelenskyy wants to make a deal. I don’t know if Putin does,” Trump said.
During the ABC News debate in September, Trump claimed he would settle the war between Russia and Ukraine before he got into office.
At one point, he had also signaled that the war would be over within 24 hours of becoming president.
